The increasing number of security breaches of networked computer equipment has led to hardware and software devices designed to provide security from viruses, worms, and other annoying, or irreversibly harmful computer programs designed to exploit an unprotected computer system. One popular technique of protecting a user or plurality of users on a network is to install a firewall program between, for example, the Internet and the gateway of an Intranet serving those user(s).
In particular, a firewall program is a set of related programs located at a network gateway server that protects the resources of a private network from users from other networks (e.g., the Internet). An organization or entity with an intranet that allows its employees/users access to the wider Internet typically installs a firewall program to prevent outsiders from accessing its own private data resources, and for controlling what outside resources its own users have access to.
The firewall program examines the data traffic through the gateway to determine whether to forward the data traffic to a particular destination. In particular, the firewall program examines data packets addressed to the network (LAN) where the firewall program resides. The firewall programs may be installed on a separate host computer, on a router, or other network hardware capable of receiving packetized information and hosting the firewall program.
Typical software-based firewall programs log events in a log file. The firewall programs do not provide contemporaneous feedback when, for example, a hacker is trying to infiltrate the network. Rather, a dialog window may subsequently be provided when a filtering event occurs. The dialog windows require user action to clear the screen. Repeated filtering by the firewall program repetitiously initiates the dialog window and requires constant user interaction to clear the screen, which may become annoying to the user. Many users simply disable the dialog window, and only keep the logging to the log file enabled. As such, there is a need to notify a system administrator or end-user of instances where data traffic is being blocked (i.e., filtered) by a firewall program in a network environment.